At 07:17 PM 2/21/95 -0500, Keith Moore wrote:
>Mailing lists aren't generally created
>for the purpose of allowing people to advertise on them.
I disagree. Mailing lists aren't that different from Magazines, especially
when you are talking about something like China News Digest (which is
essentially publoshed using a list), or a moderated mailing list.
Consumer reports magazine, for example, won't sell my name to other
companies, but they do take money to distribute marketing materials to me
directly. This way, they can control what their readership gets. A list is
very similar in this regard, and it strikes me that it is up to the
list-manager's discretion whether to open the list to paid messages.
Let me make a different point. Some customers of ours use InfoMagnet to
search several lists for people asking questions their product can answer.
For example, if you sell medical supplies, you might want to know whenever
the word "buy" or "purchase" comes up in the medical groups. When the topic
does come up, you might contribute to the group and simply say "We sell
medical supplies, check this URL for more info"
I'm on a Lotus Notes group, and the group generally welcomes vendors coming
in and discussing their solutions to a problem being discussed. Prohibiting
the vendors from contributing would take away a significant source of
information.
I'd also point out that usually that list are in fact nothing but a vehicle
to "advertise" one's opinion. Each person's opinion is shaped by different
factors. When a vendor is advertising their opinion, people tend to object
if they sense that the opinion is based more on a need to earn a living than
the intrinsic truth of the opinion.
And finally: has no-one noticed that the signature lines at the bottom of
each person's email message is in fact an advertisement?
To me the issue of advertising on the net is an issue of style. If the
advertiser is contributing to a list topic and doing so in a fairly unbiased
way, it seems to be accepted by the list members.
For people really interested in Internet marketing issues, I recommend these
lists:
GLOBALMC: Global Marketing Consortium Discussion List
GLOBMKT: Applied Global Marketing
MARKET-L: For the Discussion of Marketing
RITIM-L: Telecommunications and Information Marketing
RITMVIEW: RITIM Views on Info Tech Markets and Consumers
John
John Buckman - jbuckman@shelby.com - (301) 718-7840
Walter Shelby Group Ltd. - Internet Software Publishers
http://www.shelby.com/pub/shelby/ - ftp://ftp.shelby.com/pub/wsg
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